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Abstract

This paper investigates prospective teachers' declarative knowledge about writing instruction at two points in the beginning of their teacher education program prior to the opportunity to teach. Interview protocols are described and interpreted as they relate to prospective teachers' knowledge of the writing process, writing strategies that underlie the components of the writing process, and teaching procedures for communicating information about process and strategies to pupils. Of particular interest is the distance traveled by prospective teachers in their declarative knowledge about writing instruction as a result of course work in methods of teaching writing, and especially as their changing knowledge may affect their ability to instruct special education writers. The results of the interview analysis indicate that prospective teachers readily receive information about writing instruction from coursework, but reveal little knowledge of how to implement such instruction. The paper concludes by discussing the task of teacher education as it is cast in terms of preparing teachers to implement competent instruction in writing to regular and special education learners.

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The Beginning Capacity to Teach Writing

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